Onslaught's Prayer
by Romanec
Summary: XFC AU drabble. In an apocalyptic future where mankind's attempt to wipe out Mutants has backfired and infected them instead, the Mutant children have a prayer of the one who keeps them safe. It hurts Erik to hear it. Implied slash.
1. Onslaught's Prayer

_**Disclaimer: I do not own X-Men. Marvel does.**_

**A/N: **Writer's Block buster for the "post anything you write" challenge. An AU drabble based off of an ... apocalyptic future. A zombie apocalyptic future.

*after being very thoroughly chastised (I still claim to be right), for this story, view Onslaught as the movie version of Jean's Phoenix. For more information on Onslaught, I recommend Wikipedia. :)

**Rating: T. **This particular entry to this universe is not gorey.

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><p><strong>Onslaught's Prayer<strong>

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><p><em>Every night before I sleep<em>

_I pray in case of death, God my soul will keep_

_For the World is bleeding and the pits are dark and deep,_

_And the monsters walking want my flesh to keep._

**-x-**

He was already up the stairs at the first syllable of the first yell.

"Daddy Erik! _Daddy Erik_!"

In all honesty, he didn't sleep anymore.

"_Erik!_"

And he no longer cared about the doors he burst through – dents and splinters were the fashion now.

He slammed into Ororo's room with fear that his blood cells had begun to breed by habit and no longer obeyed, breathing frantic even as his eyes sought out the tiny figure of his youngest charge. He didn't move more than two steps into the room, braced against the abused doorframe even as the echo of the door hitting the wall reverberated painfully in his ears. Ororo was there, small and quaking so violently that she wasn't standing still, staring out of her large window. Outside, the screaming sky, red with anger and death and misplaced brutal violence, churned with brilliance and smoke – small slivered strips of orange admitted to morning, remnants of a Sun that no longer gave a damn.

"Ororo," he called out softly, beckoning. "Liebling." She turned toward him slowly, mouth slightly agape, her eyes as shockingly white as her hair, a tribute to her fear. But the weather did not heed her call – no rain fell, no wind blew – the climate completely gone. "Come away from the window," he commanded firmly.

"They're – they're outside." Her lips trembled; she didn't move. Her white walls were awash with a faint glow of the red of the sky – there were several reasons he had ordered all of the children to keep their curtains drawn. "Erik, they're _right outside_."

"Not even close," he assured, and now he did move. Ororo, only seven, was new, recovered only a few weeks ago on one of Sean's missions that had gone so, so very _wrong_. She knew in theory that they were safe, but she still feared – the fear of a survivor whose salvation had come far too late, and with too much blood. He approached her carefully, aware of her tension, eyes trained solely on her, ears blocking out all other sounds of horror other than the rasp of her shallow breathing. Her polished dark skin was worryingly pale, her shaking more pronounced, eyes still white-on-white and desperate. Careful schooling kept the flinch from his face at the sight of the shadows dancing across her body as he knelt before her, and clasped her hands.

"Ororo," he beckoned again, squeezing her small fingers warmly. "Ororo. I promised you, didn't I? And you know that-"

"They're right _outside_-," she began to protest.

"- _he will not let them in_."

The child instantly silenced. And almost as if on cue, a powerful wave of pure _contentsafetyloveminemine**mine **_washed through the room. Over the house, extending outside. _Passionfuryangerrage powerpowerpower, _Erik could feel it all– the wretched screeching moans of the damned and the hungry that had been building outside gave way to inhuman screams of pain.

The shadows across Ororo's shoulders mimicked and exploded like confetti, more red painting the sky. The walls. He bit his tongue hard enough to taste his own blood. He wondered if one of them had been Sean.

"_Onslaught_," she breathed. A bitter smile twisted onto Erik's lips as he brushed her hair away from her face.

"You are safe here, Child," he whispered – promised – repeated – swore. A strand of fierce foreign familiar agreement touched his mind, and with a wave of his hand the metal rings drew the curtains closed once more. The walls became white again immediately.

The Human race may have fallen to their governments' own attempt to erase the Mutant population – inhaling the released airborne fumes meant for his people – but that did not mean his children had to endure the sight of the horrific inhuman creatures they had become.

'_Zombies_,' a helpful voice added, known and yet tainted and unfamiliar. '_Alex calls them zombies. Do try and keep up, Magneto_.'

Erik scooped Ororo up, holding her close though her eyes were already returning to normal, and ignored the information.

"Back to sleep with you," he whispered as she clutched to his neck, burying her face in his shoulder. "You can cuddle with Hank. He's still in bed. And I believe Scott and Jean are alread there." The Beast, their Abolisher – only children could look at him and still see who he was anymore. Even Ororo, who had seen it. "I have things to do."

Charles. Friendbrotherlover. Still locked down in Cerebro, white-faced and eyeless and all power.

_Onslaught_.

Savior. Stranger.

"Thank you, Daddy," the little girl whispered against his skin.

"Just do not open the window again," he replied as softly, and felt her nod. "Say your prayer again."

She obeyed, and tucked in place, she did not see him finally fall to his flinch as her voice carried down the hall and into him.

"Every night before I sleep

I pray in case of death, God my soul will keep

For the World is bleeding and the pits are dark and deep,

And the monsters walking want my flesh to keep.

But God is fair, and God is kind,

For while I suffer, and while I cry, he sent me Onslaught,

To protect my kind."

_'Charles.'_

_'I'm still here.'_

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><p><strong>AN:**

_A short side story to a story I haven't written yet._

_Thoughts?_


	2. side story: The Abolisher

**_Disclaimer: I do not own X-Men. Marvel does._**

**A/N: Writer's Block buster for the "post anything you write" challenge. Just an added drabble that takes place during the same time (or maybe … an hour before?) of the original piece. I had to post it. Absolish/Beast/Hank has such a story I had to hint at. :)**

**And thank you all _so much_ for your reviews! I'm glad you like the universe. ^_^**

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><p><strong><em>The Abolisher<em>**

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><p>"<em>One day, Mrs. McCoy, your son will go blind."<em>

"_There's …there's nothing that can be done?"_

"_I'm afraid not. But never fear – society has grown more accepting and accommodating of the disabled. Henry will be no burden. At least he will have no physical deformations."_

**-x-**

Life is nothing but cold bitter irony most recently delivered in the screams and violence of mankind, and they walk as though they eternally drag their sins behind them with chains across their shoulders..

And he rips through them like his is blind, bathes in their tainted blood and roars in fury at the taste of _audacity to attempt_.

_The Abolisher_, the people call him – the blue demon of mercy. The _Beast_. The one who falls from the sky and tears the Inhumans to shreds – pulling melted skin from decaying bone and slicing through the smaller ones as though they're nothing more than wisps of smoke in his path. The Abolisher has no feelings, no thoughts – he is an animal, the beast that everyone proclaims him to be, and he doesn't care that what he destroys was oncecouldpossiblybeagain just as human as he is. Because under the red sky and on the breaking ground he isn't human, either.

"Hank?"

Instantly, his eyes snap open, molten amber against the black of his bed sheets, and lock on to the figure whose head is sticking tentatively through his door. A small flash of red, rattling breaths, no small amount of fear that was far too common these days, and … yes, the antique vase on his side table shaking just slightly.

Jean, then. Ten years old. Red hair, brown eyes, and a telekinetic ability that agitated Charl-_Onslaught,_ as much as it endeared him. A long, thick scar that ran down the underside of her jaw, through her throat and to the middle of her chest. The intended victim of an Inhuman, it had been slicing her open when Beast had jumped from the hovering Blackbird and right onto it. And that had been his first image of Jean, unconscious and dying and covered in thick darkened blood of _his _victim and fuck!—he had picked her up and carried her across the destruction of their mission, their battlefield, and sewed her back up right there on the plane. She had woken up as the last stitch went in, strong and dying, and stared at him – blue, murderous, unhuman _him_ – and there had been no fear.

Like now.

"What are you doing up?" He whispers back, already sitting up, already reaching for his glasses because he isn't blind but it's not simple, and sees her in clearer focus. Looking at him, beseeching him, pale hands wringing his nightdress in a tight worried grip and pleasepleaseplease – "Jean..."

"Please, Hank?" There's just the smallest touch of a quiver in her voice; she bites her lower lip, looks down. The Abolisher would ignore her. Beast would snarl at her.

A quiet moment, and then a sigh.

Hank reaches out for her. "Come on – watch you don't trip on the rug. Here, do you want—alright, then." Offers of the larger pillow are foregone as the little girl burrows tightly against him, burying her face into the crook of his neck, clutching tightly to his fur as she shivers. Part of him growls at the contact, but Hank just sighs, pulls her closer, and whispers, "Did you say your prayer?"

"Yes." And that's it. It's so routine that it hurts. Domesticity in Hell.

They say the children come to him because he's safe – Alex jokes it's because he's like a giant teddy bear. Angel and Darwin say it's because he's the first one they see when they find them. Sean says – _said, used to say_ – it's because Hank is just … safe. Protecting. Still warm, somehow – intact where the rest of them have ripped open their chests and pulled out their hearts to use as weapons. He's pretty sure it's because, this far down in the mansion, his room is the only one without windows. Because there's nothing about him that can be comforting.

Raven would disagree. Raven would say, _had said_, much the same as Sean. She had laughed and smiled and kissed him and told him he was _perfect_. Raven would be angry, if she could hear him now. But Raven isn't here - no one knows where she is, not even _Onslaught_ - and so she couldn't.

And she hadn't seen, doesn't see, the way he rips through the once-humans and bathed in their blood and calls it_ easy_.

He stays awake – stares at the ceiling, dark and cold and metal – and next he knows ten-year-old Scott is silently padding up to his bed, head piece in place and shuddering so violently it's clacking. Scott, who has an older brother, who has Alex, slowly slinks into his bed, timid as usual, waiting for rejection that stings Hank's mind. He tucks the boy into his other arm. He doesn't ask, doesn't comment.

There's probably something poetic about this. Something _Charles_ would have loved to comment about, in that understanding, slightly smug way he did. Children cuddling up to the big bad monster who lifted them up and avenged them.

"You're okay," he breathes to Scott, pulling him closer. To Jean, still asleep but restless, aware of the other child. "Everything will be alright. It'll be alright."

They don't answer, falling asleep against him like he's worth something.

In an hour, the mansion, fortified with iron and steel and metalmetalmetal, will pulsate with fury and protection and an underlying sense of something he can't name. Jean will shift with a whimper, telepathic backlash, and his door will open. In an hour, Erik will wait until Hank acknowledges his presence as non-threatening, and then come into his room, tiny little Ororo asleep in his arms, and carefully lay her across his chest, where she will snuggle into her fur and sleep without nightmares. In an hour, he will observe Erik, and see a shimmer of someone not real – of Charles, untainted and standing and sad – standing at the man's shoulder, watching him like he did before … before. In an hour, Erik will nod and return to Cerebro and Onslaught. He will leave Hank.

Hank, with the children asleep and trusting against him.

And tomorrow, Hank will slaughter more.

**-x-**

"_One day, Mrs. McCoy, your son will go blind."_

_Stunned silence._

"_There's …there's nothing that can be done?"_

"_I'm afraid not. But never fear – society has grown more accepting and accommodating of the disabled. Henry will be no burden. At least he will have no physical deformations."_

"_Well … yes, I suppose. There is that. Hank's a good boy. Blindness, while cumbersome, is nothing compared to having a child so … inhuman."_

_A boisterous laugh._

"_Else you would have to put him down."_

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><p><strong>AN:**

_And I don't even like zombies … but I guess I dig mine. Er, anyway. Yeah. I'll get you that longer piece … or more drabbles. Or something. I'm in the middle of typing everyevery**everything** I've got written, but I wanted to share this piece **now **(instant gratification, who said I wasn't greedy?), and okay._

_Let me know what you thought? :)_


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